Teaching Oral Language via Technology

[Dan Harvey]

Check out the ACORNS project at http://cs.sou.edu/~harveyd/acorns

It is a free download.

On Fri, Sep 2, 2011 at 9:38 AM, Mary Hermes <mhermes at umn.edu> wrote:

> The Institute for Advanced Studies here is sponsoring a one day workshop
> between terms (so January, 2012)
> for teachers who are trying to figure out how to use this software
> (Ojibwemodaa).
> I will lead, and also use the opportunity  to help them switch toward oral
> proficiency,
> as opposed to the written that many teachers use.  I can invite all of you,
> I think it is a free-bee,
>  a good opportunity to put our heads together about using software to teach
> indigenous languages.
>
> Basically, we are using unscripted conversations as our content.
> There is a grammar reference built in (so grammar on demand) enough
> sentence patterns along with word by word
> re-dictated flashcards to get a learning going in the direction of
> speaking. I think it is a step in the right direction.
>
> Please do try the demo and let us know!
> Much room for more to do.
>
> --------------------------------------------
> Mary Hermes, PhD
> I
>
>
> On Sep 2, 2011, at 11:22 AM, Dale McCreery wrote:
>
> > Hi!  I look forward to trying out Ojibwemodaa.  A few years back I
> > downloaded the pimsleur Ojibwe course and found it fairly useful, and
> have
> > been working towards incorporating something similar into a way of
> > teaching Michif.  Basically, we created a couple sequences for the
> > different aspects of the grammar, morphology, syntax, etc that a new
> > student would need to learn and have been making purely audio lessons to
> > teach them, though we’re still pretty early in the process.  The idea is
> > to combine these with a couple hundred hours of audio recording that has
> > been done going over the SIL Dictionary Development Plan (?), which is
> the
> > way i learnt the language myself (though I used a couple different Cree
> > textbooks to acquire the grammar of the language before doing the
> > documentation).  Once the students have the structural knowledge to
> > understand what is being said, they can then learn the vocabulary and
> > reinforce their knowledge of grammar through hearing it used in
> > conversations (translated) and they should also then be able to learn
> more
> > from our elders who speak the language but might not have an idea as to
> > how to teach it.
> >
> > I think that a method that can naturally introduce the grammar of a
> > language (orally), combined with (lots of) recordings that explore the
> > vocabulary in a natural setting is probably the easiest approach, at
> least
> > in terms of how much work it takes to produce compared to the results (I
> > hope!).  Especially for languages where the community does a lot of
> > arguing over orthography.
> >
> > -dale-
> >
> >
> >>>
> >>> Hi Craig and All,
> >>>
> >>> We have created a software for teaching Ojibwe, using tools from
> >>> Transparent Language.
> >>> Teachers are starting to use this for distance language courses (I
> >>> know two in particular).
> >>> Still not a perfect replacement for a speech community, but at least
> >>> offers videos of semi-natural conversations.
> >>> It does have built in voice recognition, pronunciation practice and
> >>> conversation practice.
> >>> Our tool is: Ojibwemodaa, find it at :
> >>> www.grassrootsindigenousmultimedia.org
> >>>
> >>> And write to me or Kevin if you want more info!
> >>> Good luck
> >>> What language/s do you work in?
> >>>
> >>> --------------------------------------------
> >>> Mary Hermes, PhD
> >>> Visiting and Associate Professor, Curriculum and Instruction
> >>> University of Minnesota
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >> On Sep 2, 2011, at 9:30 AM, Craig Spaulding wrote:
> >>
> >>> What can anyone recommend for an approach to teaching language via
> >>> the internet or DVD where the main goal/focus is oral language
> >>> without all the trappings and issues of dealing with literacy? I use
> >>> to work at Rosetta Stone and their approach was highly integrated
> >>> with literacy, though it could be customized by the user to focus on
> >>> the audio/verbal component. Unfortunately, they are not taking on
> >>> any more projects for the near future and I wondered if there were
> >>> other software approaches that list members know of or have
> >>> experience using that are effective.
> >>>
> >>> Thanks in advance.
> >>>
> >>> Craig
> >>
> >>
>
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